Bore Reducers

What Are Top Hats?

Top hats (bore reducers) are designed to fit precisely inside a ball bearing or castor bolt hole. The internal diameter of top hats have an open tolerance allowing for a smaller axle to be used than the nominal bearing size. This also allows for non-precision axles to be used, such as a commercial bolts. Top hats allow for a larger sized bearings to be used in a wheel for more load capacity. As in the below example, a wheel within a bracket using a bolt and nut should be paired with a bearing spacer, as this prevents the tightening force of the bolt and nut pushing the bearings together which will prevent them spinning freely.

Using Richmond’s top hats you will have complete flexibility to correctly fit a wheel to a smaller metric or imperial shaft. Please note, a wheel with top hats should always be a snug with an axle (never a sloppy fit). Our range of reducers makes this easy for you.

Steel Top Hat Reducer Range

High Impact Nylon Polymer Reducer Range

These are primarily used to reduce the bore size of Richmond’s pneumatic and puncture proof wheels.